The Vancouver Whitecaps have brought a blog post to the attention of the Vancouver Police Department, one that details a series of allegations against a former coach of its women’s team.

The allegation resurfaced this week after a group of players from the 2007-08 Canadian women’s U20 national team pool, who mostly played for the Whitecaps women’s team, released a statement condemning the Whitecaps and the Canadian Soccer Association for their handling of a 2008 inquiry into the coach’s conduct.

The Whitecaps women’s team and the national team were coached by the same person. Postmedia News is choosing not to identify the coach as no charges have been laid.

Twelve players released a joint statement on Monday alleging they witnessed or experienced incidents of “abuse, manipulation or inappropriate behaviour” by a coach.

Allegations include a coach rubbing a player’s thigh, sending players sexual text messages, making lewd comments about a player’s wet jersey and ignoring a player at practices, games and team meetings after she stopped replying to personal messages from the coach.

The Whitecaps and Canada Soccer issued separate statements this week saying that concerns about behaviour within their programs in 2008 were investigated and after the investigation was complete, the organizations “mutually parted ways” with the coach.

The Whitecaps statement says the club is concerned that details in the athletes’ statement did not come forward in 2008 and that the Whitecaps have contacted police in Vancouver to see if further action is now required.

Most of the issues raised by the former players and those involved revolve around the conduct of the 2008 investigation and the fact the coach was not until recently stopped from working elsewhere with young female soccer players.

“(I felt) shock, concern and fear,” said Anoop Josan, who was part of Canada Soccer from 2005 to 2008 and the Whitecaps in 2008.

“I felt concerned,” added Eden Hingwing, who played for the U20 national team from 2006 to 2008, when she quit in September of that year. She also played for the Whitecaps from 2006 to 2009.

“Coaches who have behaved inappropriately with players or who demonstrate a pattern of abusive behaviour should not be allowed to retain their coaching licences.

“Canada Soccer and the Vancouver Whitecaps should address what happened in 2008, and why (the coach) was enabled to coach young girls today.”

The coach at the centre of the allegations has declined to comment and has been relieved of coaching duties for a local youth team.

Andrea Neil and her family are pictured with Whitecaps president Bob Lenarduzzi during the 2014 ceremony inducting her into the team’s Ring of Honour.Tom Ewasiuk/AFTN /
PNG

This is the third time an alumna of that era has voiced concerns since the end of February, starting with a blog post from Ciara McCormack, then a public statement from former Canada player Andrea Neil. After the initial post by McCormack entered into the public conversation, the coach was suspended by their club team, pending an internal investigation.

In a statement on her website last week, Neil outlined her concerns into how the 2008 investigation was handled. She and the players involved said few, if any, players were interviewed by the third-party investigator. And they wanted to know why parents of the players — many of whom were minors — were not informed of the 2008 investigation or its outcome by either the CSA or Whitecaps.

“Considering the seriousness of the accusations that were coming from some parts of the team, why were the vast majority of the players, some of whom were central to the allegations, not spoken to as part of the process?” her post read.

“In my opinion, the scope of the investigation was actually quite limited, and I think the soccer community deserves to know why the Whitecaps and Canada Soccer chose to conclude it as quickly as they did.

“Secondly … when the independent fact-finder was close to concluding her inquiry, she spoke to me about what one of her recommendations would be to the Whitecaps and Canada Soccer concerning the coach involved. She told me that she would be informing the organizations that the staff member at the centre of the investigation should avoid future roles such as coaching, as she felt that they could not manage what she called the power imbalance between role as a coach and (the) relationship with the players.

“I, like many others, was understandably puzzled when the inquiry then concluded with the ‘mutual decision’ to part ways. Despite what I had been told by the independent fact-finder, in the end the inquiry was brief, the conclusion swift and the outcome seemingly amicable for all parties. All parties except, of course, the players.”

UPDATE: BC Soccer is expecting to release details of our independent review within the next few weeks, including;

B.C. Soccer has launched a further investigation, but it’s unclear what its jurisdiction is. Both the Whitecaps and CSA are beyond their scope.

The U20 players want the CSA and Whitecaps to “implement formal policies using current best practices that are in line with other elite sports organizations,” which would include reporting to police or child protection agencies if there are reasonable grounds to suspect any violation of those policies. It would also mean any proof of abusive behaviour would result into the revocation of a coach’s licence.

The players also want a detailed explanation from both the CSA and Whitecaps of the 2008 incident, one that would be made public.

“We support the full and thorough investigation B.C. Soccer has announced they will be conducting, with a truly independent third-party organization,” said Hingwing. “We call for Canada Soccer and the Vancouver Whitecaps to follow in their footsteps, and conduct their own investigations by also using third-party organizations. We ask for the findings of these three investigations to be made public.

“With a proper and thorough investigation, players can share their personal experiences behind closed doors. The purpose of this statement is to encourage Canada Soccer and the Vancouver Whitecaps to conduct a proper investigation using third-party organizations and to share these findings publicly. The investigation in 2008 was not good enough, this is an opportunity to try again.”

Is there more to this story? We’d like to hear from you about this or any other stories you think we should know about. Email vantips@postmedia.com.

LISTEN: This week the Whitecaps Casuals review the team’s game against Seattle, and preview the visit of Zlatan. We also thank Tottenham for giving Liverpool three points and talk about the Premier League.

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